Animus Mutations - Nuraku
Posted: Tue Jan 26, 2021 2:49 am
Animus - Lusus Naturae
Description
In her travels and ever since she was born, Nuraku faced persecution from all, including her own kind. Lusus Naturae is the manifestation of Alphonse's inherent character flaws: escapism, and the belief in oneself as monstrous. This theme lends itself to forcing the mage to change, its mutations often making it harder to achieve any kind of symbiosis with society at large.
Apprentice - Transfiguran
Alphonse often felt she never fit in, wherever it may have been. Her attempts to be something were stifled by class, and superstition, for she was Rathor of Rakura, a pest animal associated with far too many negative concepts. Transfiguran is a sudden, harsh reality. It locks her out of her original body once undergoing her first Mold, such that she could never shift into it again. The implications for this mutation are severe and far reaching, making it hard for her to persist through society. All she retains is her capability for speech, which is nearly freely available in each of her forms by default for those with lungs and mouth. She cannot even access her original form partially for other abilities, save for being able to Imprint upon animals while within any of her forms. The benefit yielded to her is such that smaller animals down to the size of a mouse incur no additional cost, as there is no longer a mass difference to account for, and she no longer needs to be within her original form to imprint upon animals. Large animals will still incur a scaling cost difference.
Approved Here
Journeyman - Assimilator
By holding a non-living object to her body, Alphonse can draw it in as she transforms. So long as the materials are non-magical, they will become information specific to the form she just left. When she next takes that form, she gains access to it once more. She can use her Integrate to draw the items from that form into her hand or over her body at a similar cost to manifesting the trait of a Tier 1 Animal, but she is always limited to a single metallic item, a mid-sized backpack worth of goods, and a single outfit of clothing and armor per each of her true Imprinted Molds. These items may still not exceed the mass of the form. The one exception to the magic items rule applies to items tied to her soul, such as Enkindled weaponry from her Pyromancy, or enchanted items made to specifically share some kind of special bond with her soul subject to mod-approval.
Expert - Pariah
For those animals of the same variety that Nuraku has imprinted upon, her words may transcend language barriers. The animal will get a rough idea of what she means, easing the process of training animals which have acclimated to her through this implicit understanding. The animal is still limited by its intelligence, so complex information may not be possible to share. Without a bond to an animal, it will likely be fearful of her, and most can now sense something is off about her. Something dangerous. As a result, Alphonse is more likely to suffer aggression from animals in the wild, and they are more quick to flee. Walking into a room with restrained guard animals or caged pets will cause many minutes of discord near instantly for each of them that have not been at least given time to acclimate to her.
Master - Puzzlebody
An evolution of Amalgam, Nuraku may quickly shift the locations of the organs within her body in a fluid manner while Amalgam is active. The magic will see to it that her connective tissues adapt to the changes, allowing her to nestle her innards in more protected and hidden areas, or draw them out of reach. The feeling can be very distracting, painful, and sometimes even crippling in the case of nerves paralyzing her. Even the brain can be drawn down from her skull and into her chest cavity, yet still function, and this would only span the time of your typical Amalgam change for several organs at once. As Amalgam ends, her organs will return to roughly the usual place, meaning a fatal wound can eventually become fatal should her brain return to a decapitated head, for example. To survive, she would have to quickly change into a form that could function without that organ, such as a worm. Her body has become so strange and warped in its internal anatomy that the best surgeons of the world would be hard pressed to treat her beyond stitching things up.
Master - Spawn
Conversely, how can you define what forms are able to use this power? I want you to be able to keep your clothes on you even as a tiny sparrow etc, so let's talk this through.